Quick Change
by miladyRanger
Summary: Just a few small details can change the world-and suddenly, it's Aoko who finds the door to Kaitou KID's lair. A prompt for Tumblr's Gosho Girls Week 2015.


**Quick Change**

 **This fic was written for Tumblr's Gosho Girls Week 2015. The prompt I chose (since there was no way in the world I could fill any of the other ones** — **yay angst writer trying to fill fluffy prompts) was "AU in which Aoko is KID".**

 **Disclaimer: Despite all wishes to the contrary, I do not own Magic Kaito or Detective Conan.**

 **Thanks once again to NinthFeather, the best beta reader and friend on the planet.**

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To say that Nakamori Aoko was currently unhappy would be something of an understatement. Fuming perhaps, or even ticked beyond belief, were far more fitting terms—Kaito was _so_ going to pay for what he'd done tomorrow, of that there was no doubt.

Then again, after what had happened today at school, none of her classmates would really blame her if she did happen to murder the magician outright. _It'd serve him right if I brought an aquarium to school tomorrow,_ she thought rather viciously, scowling furiously at thin air. _A giant one, with tons of foot-long koi._

"Stupid, stupid, stupid," she muttered to herself, glaring at the door in front of her. "Stupid Kaito and his stupid pranks. I shouldn't have to go apologize for his being stupid."

She sighed heavily and shook her head. _Yes you do ,_ she told herself firmly. _You're the one that dared him to prove he was a better magician than Kaitou KID. You_ know _he's going to go do something incredibly stupid tonight at the heist that's going to get him in huge trouble with Dad if you don't take it back, so just apologize already!_

"Alright, fine, I'll do it," she said to no one in particular before rapping on the door, rather harder than necessary. _Thunk thunk thunk!_

No response. "Surely the idiot isn't _avoiding_ me now," she said, glancing in through the living room window. There were lights on—he had to be home, Kaito always turned the lights off when he left. "Even _he_ isn't _that_ stupid."

She waited another few seconds before hammering on the door again. _Thunk thunk thunk!_ "Kaito! I need to talk to you!"

There was a muffled groan from behind the door before it swung open, revealing a none-too-happy-looking Kaito. "What do you waaant?" he demanded rudely.

"Well to come in , first of all," Aoko retorted. "But after that—" she broke off and looked away. More quietly, she added, "I… I want to apologize."

For a few moments, she wasn't even sure that Kaito would hear her out—but he finally stepped away from the door and let her in. "It's fine," he said quietly once the door was closed behind her. "I shouldn't have—"

"It was my fault," Aoko admitted quickly. "I—I shouldn't have challenged you like that. It's not—don't do anything stupid, okay? Please? I know you're a better magician than that lousy no-good thief, anyway, so you don't have to prove it or anything. " She rubbed her hands together nervously and looked down, finding it difficult to swallow around the lump in her throat. _This is harder than I thought ._ "I—I'm sorry, Kaito."

"Aoko—" Kaito made to grab her hand but seemed to think better of it, making a flower—a blue rose, the same as always, she was a little surprised and happy to see—appear out of thin air instead. Aoko knew he had to have taken it out of his sleeve, could do the same herself even, but that didn't make it mean anything less. The simple trick had become something of a tradition between the two of them over the years. Ever since Kaito had introduced himself at the clock tower, the two of them had been giving each other roses whenever they needed to apologize or cheer the other up.

She smiled slightly as she took the rose from him, spinning it gently between her fingers. "Thanks," she said quietly. "I just—I shouldn't have done that, and I _really_ don't want you to get in trouble with Dad, so can you just forget I said anything?"

"Sure," Kaito said, smirking smugly as he added condescendingly, "Just as long as you admit I'm _way_ cooler than Kaitou KID will ever be."

"Why you—" Aoko made a grab for Kaito's collar but missed, the magician grinning hugely before he turned tail and made a run for it as she gave furious chase.

Seven minutes later, the house looked rather like a particularly vicious hurricane had torn through it. Playing cards were scattered wildly across the living room and through the kitchen. The dining room chairs were rather precariously leaning against the walls and the table. The couch had gained several suspiciously dark spots. Books were lying all over the floor where they had been flung from the bookshelves. One of the couch pillows had mysteriously made its way into the kitchen sink. But, best of all, a certain magician had, at long last, been trapped in a blanket on the floor and given spectacularly polka dotted hair, to the vast amusement of one Nakamori Aoko.

"Gotcha!" Aoko crowed happily as she stood, letting Kaito wriggle himself out of the blanket. "How do you like _that_ , Mr. I Have Spots?"

Kaito glared at her, running a hand through his hair nervously. "What did you use ?" he demanded. "If it doesn't come out—"

"Oh come on , when have I ever used a dye that didn't come out?" Aoko said, admiring her work. The polka-dots showed up quite well, since she'd dyed his hair white before adding the colorful spots. " I think you look quite sharp," she teased. "You really ought to go look at it."

"Ooooh, I can't _believe_ you!" Kaito said before stomping off to look at himself in the mirror.

Aoko grinned wickedly, counting down until Kaito could see his new hairstyle for himself. _Ooh, this is going to be great! In three, two, one…_

"Aoooookooooo!" Kaito yelled. "Polka dots? Seriously ? You dyed my hair white and stuck polka dots all over it?! Do you even realize how much of a _pain_ this is going to be to get out?"

"Better get it before it sets!" Aoko sing-songed back, fetching the vinegar out of the kitchen cabinet for him.

Kaito snatched it from her hands, glowering heavily. "If this doesn't come out—" he threatened darkly before he stomped off, muttering under his breath, his over exaggerated irritation almost making Aoko laugh. She knew he wasn't actually mad at her—for all the screaming, she could tell he'd been struggling to hide a smile.

Still, she did manage to politely wait until she heard the shower start running to actually break down and laugh. _Ah, there's nothing like a good prank to take away the tension_ , she thought to herself, smiling. Though, speaking of which…

Aoko glanced around the living room, noticing for the first time exactly what a mess the two of them had made, and grimaced. _Oops. Better clean this up before he gets back…_

It was easy enough to put most of the house back to rights, but picking up all of the scattered playing cards and making sure they all had their respective cards took a little time. Aoko sighed happily when she'd finished separating the five decks, reverently giving one last check to a set that Kaito's father had given him when he was six. Thankfully she had managed to find all of the cards for that deck-Kaito may not have cared much about the others, but Aoko knew just how much the older blue-and-white set meant to him.

"I'd better put these back before anything _else_ happens to them," she mused aloud before heading up to Kaito's room. He usually kept these cards in a card box on his desk, so how they had gotten downstairs at all was something of a mystery. _Though, with what I said at school…_ Aoko winced. _He probably needed to feel close to his dad._

She paused in the doorway, unsurprised but still somewhat amused to see that Kaito's room was, as usual, a complete disaster area. "Will he never learn to pick up after himself?" she wondered as she picked her way through the piles of clothes, books and assorted magic-related items and over to the dresser, where she carefully slid the deck of cards back into their case.

"He can be a real idiot sometimes, huh," she commented to the portrait of Kuroba- san on the wall next to the dresser, smiling softly. "Always running off, playing tricks on people—he really is trying to be just like you, you know. I think you'd be proud of him." She reached up to brush the corner of the painting, just barely touching the fragile paint—

—and was completely dumbfounded when there was a faint _click!_ and then the painting _moved under her hand_ , tilting into the wall.

"What the—?" she nearly yelled, eyes wide in shock. "There's a—no way , he wouldn't have—oh who am I kidding, it's Kaito's dad , of course he made a secret passage in his own house!" She pushed the painting just a little more and stuck her head through the opening, trying to see if it was actually a corridor or just a secret room, and suddenly found herself falling through the door and onto the floor—a very dusty floor at that; clearly Kaito hadn't been down here in a while, if he even knew this place existed at all.

Lights flickered on suddenly— motion-activated , she realized a bit belatedly—and she found herself looking up at a large room crammed floor to ceiling with magic-related paraphernalia and quite a few gadgets she couldn't even begin to identify. There were shelves and shelves of tools, a table half-buried under what looked like long metal rods, and _— oh my gosh that's a car, how in the world did he get a car in here?!_

Gaping hugely, she got to her feet and took a few steps toward the white car, completely unable to process what she was seeing. _There is a freaking car in the middle of Kaito's house, in a room whose door is an oil painting of Kaito's father, that hasn't been opened in years . What is going on here? How could there even be a secret room in this house? It's not_ that _big—_

There was a whirring sound, as if old machinery was somewhat reluctant to come back to life, and suddenly part of the floor was rising . Aoko scrambled backwards away from it, her eyes wide and disbelieving as the box opened of its own accord and suddenly turned into a dressing room closet, with a perfectly pressed white suit and a peculiar white top hat with a blue ribbon tied about it—

"Wait a minute," Aoko said to herself. "Just—that suit—that's— what is Kaitou KID's suit doing in Kaito's house?! That's impossible ! Kaito isn't KID, there's no way that—"

"Kaito doesn't know about any of this," she reasoned. "He'd have told me by now if he did—and he sure wouldn't have reacted like he did in class today if he'd known."

She broke off, swallowing hard. "Kaito isn't KID," she said more quietly. "But Kuroba- san —" She brought a hand up to cover her mouth, sucking in a shocked breath. "Kuroba-san was Kaitou KID?" she asked aloud. "All this time KID's been gone because—because Kuroba- san died? But—if that's true… who's moonlighting as KID now? Why would they—who would—"

Aoko shook herself, trying to dismiss the idea that Kuroba Toichi could possibly be alive and take up his role as KID again without telling anyone. "That's not possible," she told herself firmly. "He would _never_ leave Kaito and Chikage- san like that without telling them. Someone else has to be doing it—"

Her expression hardened as she looked back at KID's white suit, determination sparking in her heart. "And I have just the way to find out who," she said, carefully picking up the top hat and spinning it once end over end in her fingers before setting it on her head at a rakish angle, instinctively using the brim to throw her face into dark shadows.

"Better watch out, imitator," she whispered fiercely, surprised to find a wicked grin looking back at her from the full-length mirror. "I'm going to find out who you are, and you're going to tell me _everything_ you know about this."


End file.
